


Strangers in the Night

by orphan_account



Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe, Drug Use, Drugging, Eating Disorders, Emotional Manipulation, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Slow Build, Suicide, Suicide Hotline, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-08
Updated: 2015-06-21
Packaged: 2018-04-03 13:16:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,446
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4102372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve is a burnt-out college student who answers the phone for a suicide hotline. Bucky is a hot mess, and that's on a good day. He's mugging people and drinking, spiraling under the careful manipulation and strangle-tight hold of Alexander Pierce.</p><p>When Steve answers the hotline phone and it's Bucky on the other end, it's, ironically, the beginning of something between them.</p><p>"No one in the call center likes to think about the ones that slip through their fingers."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is a work in progress. Tags will be added and changed as the story grows. I intend to post regularly. Comments are always welcome. See end of work for warning about the chapter.
> 
> I really appreciate feedback!

_Chapter One_

Steve tipped his coffee cup backward into his lips but it was nearly empty. He sucked down the last few drops of precious caffeine and set the mug on his cluttered desk by his keyboard. Scattered across the surface around his phone and computer in his little cubicle, there were loose leaf papers and notebooks all over the place.

The semester was closing in on midterms and he really couldn't afford not to be studying all hours of the day, even when he was working. Besides, the phone hardly ever rang anyways and if Steve didn’t keep himself busy, he'd fall asleep working the long night hours.

Steve worked answering phone calls at a hotline call center. During the later hours of the night several days a week, he answered the phone for the local suicide number. He'd had a slapdash training on what to say and how to handle certain situations, but Steve usually did well enough. He had a good turnout rate.

No one in the call center liked to think about the ones that slipped through their fingers.

"Rogers, look alive," came a voice from the other side of the cubicle wall. Steve glanced up tiredly and saw the top of Sam's head poking up behind the divider.

"Sorry," Steve said. He rubbed his eyes. "I'm running low on caffeine."

"Lucky I made a run," Sam said. His head disappeared and a moment later, he came into Steve's cramped cubicle with a cheap coffee in a styrofoam cup. It was the dark, oily coffee from the break room, carefully doctored up with sugar packets and milk. Sam was a good friend like that. “You look half dead. Is that ex of yours still giving you trouble?”

Steve gratefully took the cup, popping the lid off and pouring it into his favorite mug. It was a birthday gift from Peggy. She’d painted stars and stripes on a cup and made herself. The hot steam rose up to his nose and he took a long drink of it, burning his tongue. “Not lately. I’m hoping he’s given up on that. It’s just midterms are killing me. It's been a long day," he said.

Sam leaned against Steve's chair, looking over his shoulder at his notes spread all over the desk. "Long day and a slow night," Sam said. It was true. Steve hadn't gotten many calls that night- which, although he deeply appreciated that as a good thing, he was close to dozing off in his chair.

"Only another half an hour," Steve sighed. At least the coffee was perking him up a little.

"If you want to head home early, I can cover both our phones," Sam offered. Their cubicles were right beside each other so they could easily hear each other's phones ringing through the thin divider.

It was something they did for each other now and again. Steve had covered Sam’s phone several times when he had other places to be. There was no harm done by it.

Steve gave him a grateful look. "Are you sure you don't mind?"

"Nah, get out of here," Sam said, waving him off. "You're useless when you're off your game, anyways.”

Steve rolled his eyes, knocking back a gulp of the hot coffee and shuffling his papers into a halfway neat pile. "Thanks," he said, but Sam's phone rang so he didn't answer, heading back to his stall.

Steve stuffed his things into his bag and stood up out of his too-small cubicle chair. He spent a lot of time in the cramped little space and it made him feel like even more of a giant than he actually was. Mug in hand, Steve waved to Sam as he walked by his cubicle on his way out.

The call center was a good job. He only had to work a few nights a week and it was typically just quiet study time, but even still, the subject matter of the work could weigh on a person. The nights he worked, he was up very late and his only social interactions besides with Sam were with strangers in a very fragile state on the other end of the phone.

More often than not, Steve was able to successfully talk down the caller or get help to the location, but every now and again, he'd lose somebody. When that happened, Steve lost a lot of sleep.

 _You can’t save everyone, Steve_ , Sam would tell him. Maybe it wasn’t a great job for Steve with his big squishy heart and hero complex the size of a continent. Some people didn’t want to be saved. It got him rent money, either way.

Steve pushed the heavy back door open and stepped out into the night. It was cold, early January. He could see his breath in the air in front of him and the sky was sharp and clear.

Steve didn't live very far from the call center, since it was almost on campus, but the walk was brutal when it got so cold. He jammed his free hand into his pocket, half hunched over. With his other hand, he clutched the hot cup, leeching the heat that was quickly dissipating into the cold air.

The first grey light of dawn spread like streaked paint across the horizon and the only sound was Steve's footsteps and frozen breaths. There was something relaxing about the silent walk alone, but then again, Steve spent a lot of time alone in general since his big breakup.

He had Sam to talk to, and Peggy when she wasn't busy, but most of the time, it felt like Steve was just pushing on through life by himself and no one would really notice if one day if sort of vanished. Before all the shit and the breakup with Brock, Steve at least felt like there was someone there beside him in it all.

It wasn’t that that he wanted to disappear, but it was a thought that came to him often, with a sense of purposelessness. He spent a lot of time wondering if he was really helping anyone.

Live, work, study, repeat and for what? Looking forward really only to the periods of sleep that came far and few? It was depressing and lonely.

The one time Steve made an offhand remark about it, Sam looked a little puzzled but called it a side effect of the job. Steve had a tendency to bring work home, apparently.

With that on his mind and the taste of coffee dying on his lips, Steve heard footsteps behind him that seemed to start out of nowhere. He smelled cigarette smoke. The hairs on his arms stood up straight.

He froze, adrenaline rushing through him. He felt something hard touch his spine.

“Nice ’n easy pal, turn around,” came a voice, followed by a long cigarette breath. Steve slowly turned around and was face-to-face with a man with a hood pulled over his eyes. The man pulled the crowbar away from where he’d been poking Steve in the back with it.

He had a cigarette hanging out of his curved lips and a thick, iron crowbar in his hand. The man's other hand came up to his lip, taking out the cigarette, and he slowly exhaled, blowing smoke onto Steve's face.

"Put your hands up," the guy said coolly. His voice was a low but not that deep, a little raspy in the cold and with the smoke. It was completely and inappropriately attractive and distinctive. He had a city accent.

Steve wasn't really processing what was happening. Was he being mugged? He was being mugged. He was stunned and hadn't moved much at all. This wasn’t his usual routine.

"I said put 'em up, pal," the man repeated, grip tightening on the crowbar. He jabbed at the air in Steve's direction. "Drop the cup and put yours hands up."

"It's- my favorite cup," Steve said, words slipping out without his own permission.

The man seemed a little taken aback and he looked up at Steve, hood sliding backward off of his head a little. Steve could make out the lines of his lips and sharp cheeks, jaw dusted with stubble. His eyes were just barely visible, sharp blue, fixed on Steve.

"What?" he said furrowing his thick brows. He flicked ash off the end of the cigarette.

"Uh- the cup- it's my favorite cup. You said to drop the cup but I don't want to break it. Because it’s my favorite,” Steve said a little awkwardly. He raised one arm and maintained eye contact as he spoke, slowly kneeling down to set the mug on the cold cement. Slowly, he stood back up, both hands half raised up. He tried to seem smaller and nonthreatening, even though he was sort of a giant.

The other guy wasn’t little, but Steve was big.

"Oh," the man said. He gave Steve a look like he was a complete weirdo, but it was Steve’s special mug. "I hate to do this to you, but, y'know. Shit happens. Wallet?"

The awful thing was, even though Steve was being robbed by the damn guy, he could sympathize. He actually felt bad for him. One had to be pretty down on their luck to resort to mugging.

"Yeah, yeah. I get it. I'm just- getting my wallet," he explained, slowly going for his pocket. He didn't want to startle the man- he had thick arms and didn't look like he was shy with that crowbar.

He dug around in his jacket pocket for the old, worn out lump of leather. It contained his student I.D., his driver's license, and exactly nine dollars in cash. He slowly offered it forward.

The man stuck his cigarette between his lips and without dropping his crowbar for a second, reached out and took the wallet with his free hand.

"There isn't much in there," Steve said, catching himself sounding apologetic. He shouldn’t sound apologetic. He should be looking at this guy like a threat, not like a project. “I, uh, I’d sure appreciate if you let me keep the student I.D. Y’know- it’s just, sorta important.”

The man opened the wallet, rifling around. Wordlessly, he picked out the I.D., taking a moment to examine it. He squinted a little.

"Yeah, sorry, _Steven G. Rogers._ Nice ID picture. It's a shame they don't let you retake if you're sneezing," he said sarcastically, reading Steve's name off the card. It should absolutely not give Steve shivers to hear his name said in that rough voice, but it absolutely did.

"I wasn't- Thanks. . ." Steve said, trailing off, not knowing what to call him.

"M' friends call me Bucky," the guy said without looking up. He took the few dollars but kept looking. He seemed almost desperate when he realized that nine dollars was all the money there was to find.

What sort of trouble was he in, Steve wondered, that he had to resort to mugging people at day break with a rusty crowbar? The man didn't have nearly a warm enough coat for the season. On his pink, cold hands, he wore socks with the fingers cut out. His shoes looked worn, too.

"Sorry I'm broke, Buck," Steve laughed, half sarcastic, half serious.

"Sorry to make you broker," Bucky said, taking one last drag on his cigarette and stomping it on on the concrete. He dropped Steve's wallet in front of Steve's feet, tucking the tiny amount of cash into his jeans pocket.

“See you around,” Steve said awkwardly.

“You better hope not,” Bucky replied with a shit eating grin on his lips and a tired, tired look in his eyes.

Just as fast as he'd appeared behind Steve, he took off and vanished around a corner behind a building. Steve was left shivering in the early dawn light, numb hands in the air, his mug and wallet sitting at his feet.

God, it was too early to deal with this crap. He wanted to just go home and pass out face down on his pillow, but now he was caught up thinking about the stranger out in the cold, with the pretty face and handsome voice and cheap gloves, nine dollars richer.

__________

When Steve got home, he nearly collapsed from exhaustion. There was a few sips worth of coffee frozen into the bottom of his favorite mug and he was nine bucks down. The whole endeavor had him a little shell shocked. He was ready to get a few hours of sleep.

He stripped out of his jacket and clothes, leaving them in a trail from the door to his bed. Peggy was spending the weekend at Angie's so there was no risk of her coming in and complaining about the mess. He fell into his bed letting out a little contented sigh as his head hit the pillow, burying his legs under his sheet and blanket.

After double checking that his alarm clock was set in time for class, he let hit eyes close and waited for sleep to take him.

Then, of course, his brain turned on and he was wide awake.

He thought of the man he met that morning- the mysterious Bucky. In all of his intimidating crowbar swinging, hooded glory, there was something about him that Steve couldn't get out of his head. Something about the flash of desperation in his sharp eyes or the way he seemed genuinely apologetic for robbing Steve, though totally competent and at ease with the crowbar.

And all that aside, Steve was no expert on the Do's and Don't's of mugging, but he was pretty sure giving a name was a Don't. Bucky seemed like he had nothing to lose and it made Steve sad.

Steve was fairly sure that one shouldn't feel nostalgic and slightly turned on after being mugged, but he was. It just didn't register as a bad event in his head. It had been startling, but not necessarily bad.

Steve wondered if that was the caffeine-fried, sad, empty part of his mind talking. He was processing it all as a pleasant experience because he was lonely and always followed the same schedule everyday but being mugged broke his routine. Maybe he was straight up crazy.

It'd wear off after a few days, and maybe in a week, he wouldn't think of it again besides being a little more wary walking home from the call center at night.

Steve couldn't truly believe that, though.

Eventually, his inner rambling went quiet and Steve fell asleep as morning light flooded into his bedroom in the apartment he and Peggy shared.

Almost like proving his own point, Steve had the same long, monotonous day as always. He walked to classes and took notes and reviewed for exams. He ate the same lunch as always, opting to sit alone in the back corner of the cafeteria so he could look over a set of flashcards while he ate.

He was having a hard time focusing completely on absorbing the material though and kept catching himself staring vacantly out the window at the icy and snow, shimmering in the late afternoon sun. He blamed it on his poor sleep and borrowed money from Sam for an energy drink.

His last lecture of the day was an art history class. The class was collectively scrambling to put last minute touches with their partners on their final presentations.

Steve's partner was a red haired girl who typically said less than a word to him in a given day, named Natasha. She was cold and actually scared Steve a little, but she was efficient and didn't bother with small talk. Between them, Steve was usually able to at least find peace in the relaxed lack of conversation.

Of course, sometimes she edged the line on rude when they actually did speak. At the start of the semester when they'd been assigned partners, Steve had made an effort to always greet her, sometimes making a joke or asking her how she was doing.

He quickly learned not to expect a response.

He slid into his chair beside her. Natasha already had her laptop in front of her, typing away editing their informative slideshow. Steve cracked the seal on his energy drink and took a few gulps of the too-sweet stuff, getting out his research notebook and syllabus checklist.

Weirdly, she didn’t look like her usual self. On a regular day, she seemed controlled and poised but not anxious. Today, Steve thought he could see bags under her eyes and she looked like she was on edge, like worried about something.

"Evenin'," he said, yawning.

Natasha didn't greet Steve, but after a moment of typing, her hands went still and she glanced up at Steve. He was holding his head in one hand and tiredly looking over paragraphs of various sources of information with a highlighter.

"You look dead," Natasha finally said.

Steve blinked, surprised at her voluntary comment. He waved it off. “I could say the same for you. I’m fine. Long night.”

Natasha stared. Something about the way she looked at people could be a little unsettling. It was like Steve could almost see the gears grinding inside her head, calculating everything, processing everything.

"What happened?" she asked.

Steve wondered why she cared enough to ask. It wasn't like she ever talked to Steve. He wasn't bitter about it, although it could be sometimes frustrating when he wanted to meet up with her and talk about ideas for the project. But mostly, that frustration had been earlier in the semester before he figured out the way that she functioned- alone.

"Why do you care?" he asked, sounding ruder than he really met.

Her expression shifted slightly and she postured herself so she was focused on the laptop screen again. "I don't," she said, going back to typing.

Steve sighed. He couldn't say he was surprised.

But then again, at least they'd made some progress.

Steve had drained his sugary energy drink by the end of the the class and Natasha hadn't said another word to Steve besides quiet, direct questions about their presentation. Steve felt like he was running on empty but he still had a shift to work that night.

Packing up his things, Steve waved goodbye to Natasha and zipped up his jacket, pulling the collar up close to his ears. His beard scratched against the inside of his collar and he breathed out through his nose, making little puff clouds in the air.

His bag felt heavy even though it was the same weight as always, and he had a generally tired feeling about him. He hoped that after the semester ended and the finals were over, that would go away and he'd start to feel normal again.

That got him thinking about what even normal meant and Steve decided he was getting too existential on too-little sleep. He skipped stopping back home. There was no point since Peggy wasn't there. Whenever she was home, she just spent most of her time with Angie, anyways, but it was nice to stop in and chat from time to time.

Steve walked past their little shared apartment and kept going across campus to the call center.

Steve had to stop falling asleep at his desk. One of these days, it was going to get him into trouble if a manager saw. It wasn't like the phone wouldn't easily wake Steve if it rang, but it was bad practice and there was a chance he could get caught by a manager having a rotten day and lose his job.

When he woke up this time, he’d only been out a few minutes.

“Come on, sleepin’ beauty,” Sam said from behind him. Steve’s head snapped up. Pieces of paper stuck to his forehead and he blinked sleepily. He groaned, stretching out a little.

“Shit, yeah, sorry,” he said, running a hand through his short hair.

Sam raised his eyebrows, leaning cautiously against the flimsy cubicle walls. “Before nine o’clock, Steve? Damn, you’re real grandpa.”

“Shut up.”

“Old man’s grumpy, huh? Miss your bedtime?” Sam joked. “Six o’clock has long since come and gone.”

Steve grumbled something mean, clumsily fumbling around in his bag and procuring another energy drink. He shook it up and cracked the seal, taking a long drink. It was too sweet and Steve could taste the chemicals, but he needed the perk-up.

“That doesn’t look healthy,” Sam admonished lightly before disappearing back into his own little cubicle.

Steve knew it wasn’t exactly healthy living off energy drinks and no sleep, but he didn’t do it often to himself. Generally, he did well caring for his on health. He and Sam used to jog together, (which ended when Steve lapped Sam for the third time), and he ate pretty well usually.

It was just the stress of the time of year, with the finals and whatnot.

He’d be back to himself in no time, he told himself, trying to make himself believe it.

The phone rang sharply, startling Steve out of his thoughts. He gulped down a last swallow of the energy drink and set it on the table, pushing homework papers out of the way so he could see his laminated page of verbal instructions. He was used to this but he didn’t like it. Steve took a steadying breath and picked up the phone.

“Hi, you’ve reached your local suicide hotline. Are you hurt?” Steve said, rattling off the default greeting and picking a fresh copy of the report form out of a folder.

The other end of the line sounded kind of fuzzy, as if cars were passing by. The person with whom Steve was speaking took a deep, ragged breath. “Nah, not yet,” he said. His voice was a little tricky to pick out of the static.

It was good that he wasn’t hurt, but the ‘yet’ implied things that made Steve sad. It meant the guy seemed to have some intention of getting hurt. Whenever he heard that phone ring, Steve always hoped it would be someone who just needed to be talked down, or needed to vent to someone confidentially. The worst best-case-scenario was someone already hurt who was regretting it and just needed an ambulance or resources.

“Alright, that’s good. What’s your name?” He said.

The guy paused. “Doesn’t matter.”

Steve frowned, tapping his pencil against the record page, leaving the ‘name’ piece blank. “If you say so. Is there a nickname or something I should call you, Mystery Man?” Steve said, trying to sound lighthearted and pleasant.

That actual elicited a little, gravelly laugh from the other end. “Mystery Man, I like that.”

“So you called for a reason, obviously. What’s going on?” Steve asked, carefully but still sounding at least somewhat lighthearted.

“Yeah, uh, well, things aren’t going super well and I don’t exactly have any one else to call anonymously about this,” the guy began slowly. “I’ve done some shitty things lately and I can’t get out of my damn job and I’m not doin’ anyone any good, I just-“

He cut himself off. Steve cleared his throat.

“Hey, hey. It’s alright,” Steve said softly, scribbling down a note of the page. “Deep breaths, okay?”

He furrowed his brow, gripping his pencil and listened carefully to the person take a couple ragged breaths. He sounded almost like he was panting. There was something about this call that had Steve especially on edge.

“God, I don’t know why I even called. I’ll quit wasting your time. Have a nice night, pal,” the voice finally said. Steve tensed up, a chill prickling up his neck, a sense of urgency in his gut. Talk like that meant every word out of Steve’s mouth could make the difference between life or death.

“No, no, you’re not wasting my time. This is my job. You- wait-“ Steve said. His brain slowly made the connection. The familiar voice. The slight accent. _Pal_. “Is this- Bucky?”

On the other end of the line, the man seemed to stop breathing for a second. Steve heard the sound of a car passing in the distance. “Bucky?” he repeated. Steve realized he sounded almost . . . _panicked_. “Do I know you?”

“Uh, yeah. Kinda,” Steve said with a forced chuckle. He had a feeling that Bucky was in bad shape and reminding him that he robbed Steve earlier might not help him. He just kept rattling on, a little awkward but friendly. “Doesn’t matter this second, okay? I just got to make sure you’re going to be okay. I’ll even call you Mystery Man still if it makes you feel better?”

Silence for a moment. “Alright.”

Steve smiled. “Alright, good. Are you safe right now?”

“Uh, basically,” Bucky said, letting out a gravelly, self deprecating laugh. It didn’t sound good.

“Basically? Where are you? Are you in any danger?”

“Fuck, it doesn’t matter. I don’t have anywhere better to go,” Bucky said.

Steve was irrationally panicking. He rarely panicked in these kind of situations. He go upset a lot when he lost someone, but this felt too personal. His face was hot and the room was spinning and his throat felt too tight. He should probably transfer the call to someone else but Steve couldn’t bring himself to do it.

He was afraid.

“It does matter, really. Are you listening? It seems bad but things can improve. What do you mean you don’t have anywhere else to go?” Steve said.

“What do you think I mean, smartass?” he said, voice dropping low. Steve blanched. Oh.

“Where are you now?” Steve asked, tone softer. He was fidgeting with his pencil compulsively, dropping any pretense of recording the conversation. The tip of his pencil smashed off when he drove it into his desk too hard.

“A bus station. What’s it to you?” Bucky snapped back. Steve’s heart ached. Jesus. It was fucking freezing out there.

“Which bus station?”

_“What’s it to you?”_

Steve glanced anxiously around and dropped the volume of his voice to near a whisper. This was breaking about every rule, but fuck it. If Bucky didn’t kill himself, the cold would do him in on a night like that.

“Which bus station, Buck? If we’re gonna talk we might as well do it somewhere warm. You didn’t call for no reason,” he pleaded. All the rules were broken now.

“No, I don’t need the charity-“

“Please, it ain’t no charity, just think about it?”

There was a long delay. Steve felt like he could hear his own pulse. He’d either hang up or not, now.

“I thought you said you wouldn’t use my damn name,” Bucky finally muttered, before giving Steve a street. It was nearby- the same street Bucky jumped Steve at.

“I’ll be there,” Steve said quickly. He double checked he had the right street before hanging up the phone. Part of him was terrified that if he hang up, he’d get to the bus station and be too late, but he reasoned with himself to try and be logical. It’d be okay. At least for now.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got a bunch of really lovely feedback on the first chapter, which I appreciated like crazy. I was so surprised and happy! Thank you so much. I love hearing from you.
> 
> This chapter is fairly heavy. Please heed the tags! They might change as the story develops.
> 
> Also, you may have noticed your flighty author changed the title but I swear it works very well! Give the song a listen after you read, would you? Thanks!

_Chapter Two_

Bucky leaned against the plastic interior wall of the bus stop. It was a bench with an overhang and flimsy walls, a bunch of ads and graffiti plastered to ceiling. It was dirty and small but better than nothing. He rubbed his hands together, holding them close to the burning end of his cigarette.

He’d been smoking nonstop since he ended up there. At first it had been to attempt calm his nerves but it got to a point when it was just because he was cold and had nothing else to do.

He was fucking freezing.

Beneath his jacket, Bucky’s chest and ribs shuddered when he breathed. He felt half numb all over, maybe from the pills, maybe from the cold, probably both. The memory of hands ghosted over his skin.

In all his layers of clothes, he had no barrier. The hands were in his head, they were just in his head. It took a lot of thinking to convince himself that- a lot of _pull it together, Barnes, you’re already at rock bottom, please let this be rock bottom-_

He didn’t want to imagine he could get any lower.

What was he doing, standing around in the dark, in the cold, waiting for some stranger from a shitty free hotline to show up and probably give him a shrink’s phone number and leave? Some punk ass kid who thought Bucky needed the charity.

It wouldn’t do him any good.

Hands touching, hitting, caressing- _Lover’s touches, sweet boy- not enough money, I only do this because I love you-_

Bucky squeezed his eyes shut and wished every bit of that bastard away. Of course, he knew he’d change his mind eventually- he always did. Bastard, lover, abuser, protector. Alexander kept Bucky just confused enough.

He wanted to scream.

He couldn’t even figure out what had possessed him to call the goddamn number in the first place.

He’d been freaked out and cold, shaking like a leaf, alone. Hating and loving being alone. He hadn’t gone home this time because he knew what would be waiting for him. Bucky had run off for a few days at a time before, even weeks, but he didn’t count what he was thinking about as running.

Running ran a risk of being caught, but not even Alexander could catch a dead man.

It was only when he tried to get out that he realized how absolutely trapped he was. No money, no family, no job, no home, no sense of self.

Boss, boyfriend or whatever the hell Alexander was, Bucky had decided he wasn’t ever going to see him again. Bucky had run before when things got bad. He’d walked out of screaming fights, he’d snuck out in the dark and binge drank for half a month, he’d go try to eat healthy and rebuild himself- it never worked. He always ended up back.

This time, Bucky wasn’t going back, even if it killed him.

Which was kind of the idea, at this point. If running got him nowhere and staying got him nowhere, what was the point?

He didn’t go back to Alexander’s that morning. He’d mugged the blonde guy out walking at dawn, which Bucky felt guilty as hell for because he hated doing bad things enough when Alexander was making him, but somehow, it was a hundred times worse when he knew it was his own choice.

He hadn’t made enough money to put him in any sort of good mood and he knew Alexander had people he wanted to loose Bucky-the-thug on that evening. Maybe it was the repetition or the fear of being punished or the guilt, but something changed and Bucky wasn’t having it.

He’d kept the tiny bit of cash he’d gained and rode buses around all morning, just to stay out of the cold while he tried to figure out where he could go. His problem was that everyone he knew was connected to Alexander one way or another. He was everywhere. Bucky just couldn’t escape him.

Natasha must have called him a dozen times but he didn’t answer her. Natasha didn’t need to be dragged back into anything involving Alexander or any of his terrifying friends or even Bucky. She’d gotten out and Bucky intended her to stay out.

He hadn’t spoken to her for days, anyways.

He thought and thought and when he ran out of money, dumped off at a bus stop near where he started, Bucky came to the conclusion that he had fucking nothing.

From there, he had a panic attack at the bus stop, popped a pill, went through what liquor he had left sloshing around in the bottom of a flask in his bag. He was a wreck. If he didn’t go back to Alexander, he’d freeze or overdose or starve.

Not going back was suicide. And he wasn’t going back.

It had mostly been a coincidence that there was an ad listing the hotline number posted up inside the crappy bus stop wind shelter. Bucky had nothing better to do while he froze his ass off.

So he’d called the number. And now, apparently some office jockey working the night shift was coming to visit Bucky at his grand old bus stop, in all his piece-of-shit glory.

Bucky paced. It kept his feet from going numb. Maybe he should book it now before the guy showed up. He knew Bucky’s name, which was fucking weird, and the whole situation made him antsy. It had been a stupid, irrational, spur of the moment decision to call.

He could almost hear Alexander’s voice in his ear.

_My lovely good boy, if you don’t do what you’re told, it’ll be bad for you._

Bucky was a second away from losing all control and calling Alexander to come get him when he saw headlights in the distance coming down the street. He pulled his hood on tighter, heart catching in his throat.

A car came down the street. The headlights illuminated the smoke around Bucky from his cigarette and his every puff-cloud of a breath. The car stopped at the curb, the engine cut, the lights died.

In his head, Bucky felt a flicker of fear that somehow it was Alexander, but he crushed it down and held steady.

Bucky stood still, waiting to size up the person he was dealing with. In his head, he was already thinking of how he would play it off. _Oh, no, thanks, but I’m fine now. No, no, I was just kidding, I’ll go home right now, to my house, that I have, and sleep in the bed that I have. I’ll be fine._

Right.

The car door opened with a creak and a massive man stepped out. From where Bucky was standing, he was just a silhouette in front of a streetlight. From what he could tell, it looked like all his clothes were a little too small, beside his long coat that almost got caught when he shut the car door again.

There were two steaming cups in his hands.

“Hey,” the guy called from several yards away, standing still. The wind blew and Bucky trembled at the cold that snuck through the slats in the bus-stop walls, but the man didn’t even sway. He was big and solid.

“Hey,” Bucky croaked back. His voice was wrecked from the cold and smoking. He bit his lip hard to stop himself from imagining what Alexander would have to say about that.

The guy didn’t really move. “It’s awful cold out here,” the man said bleakly. “Car’s warm. Wanna sit?”

Bucky blew out a mouthful of smoke and scraped his cigarette into the icy sidewalk. He did. He wanted to sit in a warm car with a perfect stranger. Even better if he turned out to be a murderer. Bucky didn’t care.

“It’d be my pleasure,” Bucky called, crossing the perilous, icy street to get to the car. The closer he got to the man and the car, the more familiar he seemed. He was blonde and huge and a little awkward-

Oh God.

It dawned on Bucky just as he was sliding into the passenger seat. He could almost see his own guilt reflected in the sheepish face of the man.

“Oh, fuck. . .” Bucky breathed.

“Sorry, I know, I know-“

“Steven G. Rogers,” Bucky said , remembering reading the name off the ID. Of all the people in the world to be dealing with right now, of all the random, terrible coincidences, and it’s some poor sap Bucky mugged with a crowbar for nine dollars.

“That’s awful formal,” Steve said gently, with a look on his face like he knew Bucky felt bad and he wished he wouldn’t. Bucky appreciated that but he resented it, too. He just wanted to not have done the shitty thing in the first place, and it wasn’t Steve’s fault but Bucky felt frustrated at him anyways. It was easy to be a dick to other dicks but nice guys made Bucky feel bad.

“I’m real sorry,” Bucky began.

“Don’t know what you’re talking about. Do you like hot chocolate?”

“Yes you do, you knew my name, you know what I’m talking about-“

“I mean, I already got the hot chocolate so you might as well drink it-“

Bucky tried to keep apologizing without being cut off, but Steve pushed a hot mug into Bucky’s cold hands and his mouth shut. A breathy sigh escaped his lips as the heat brought feeling back to his fingers. “Thanks. . .”

Steve smiled. “No problem. My friend Sam made it. He makes the best hot drinks and I figure they usually perk me up. Sorry for no whipped cream.”

Bucky could smell the chocolate and steam. He was dizzy with it. Stomach grumbling, Bucky thought back to the last time Alexander told Bucky he shouldn’t eat so much. He looked up at Steve in disbelief. “You know, I mugged you. And you brought me hot chocolate,” he said dumbly.

“Shit happens,” Steve said with a shrug, stirring his own hot chocolate with a plastic coffee mixer. The hot chocolate was fixed in styrofoam cups like one might find in a break room, but Steve was very carefully pouring his into a mug with stripes and stars.

Bucky didn’t want to talk about why Steve was actually there so held his drink close for the heat and stared. He recognized the cup. “Ha, wow, that really is your favorite mug, huh?”

“What?” Steve said, and then slowly, “Oh, oh, yeah. Yeah, it was a gift. I just like it a lot.”

Bucky could at least say he hadn’t made the guy smash his own favorite damn mug.

“Oh.” Bucky nodded. He still didn’t drink the hot chocolate. Alexander would be mad if he knew, he’d be so mad and Bucky would be banned from eating for a week or some other punishment.

 _But he’ll never know,_ Bucky suddenly realized.

He took a tentative sip and nearly moaned it was so good on his tongue. The chocolate and the warmth and the smooth creaminess of it.

“So, uh. We should talk, then, now that you’re settled,” Steve interrupted carefully. Bucky could hear the caution in his voice, like he’d figured out Bucky was like a loose nuke.

“I don’t have a lot to say,” Bucky said, matching his tone.

Steve leaned forward a little, elbows resting on the wheel. “It’s hard to talk about this kind of thing and I get that and I’m no shrink but I’ll try to walk you through to some kind of solution.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Bucky repeated with a little shrug. “I don’t think I should have called in the first place, but now I’m warmer with better company than a moment ago. I’m just sort of at the end of my rope and I didn’t know what else to do.”

“That’s okay, that makes sense,” Steve said reassuringly, like he heard that sort of thing all the time. Bucky supposed he did. “Do you want to talk about anything specific?”

“Not really,” Bucky said. “Sorry to disappoint. Look, I’m still wasting your time. Did you leave work for this? Fuck, I don’t want to get you in trouble.”

“No, no, no,” Steve said quickly. “It doesn’t matter. This is my job. Besides, remember that friend I was telling you about who makes the good cocoa? Well, he’s covering my phone. So really, you busted me out of the job and I owe you one.”

It seemed like he had some way to debunk every negative thing Bucky said which was impressive. As Natasha once so eloquently put it, “ _You’re a bitter little ball of hate, Barnes._ ” He’d been bitter as hell when she said so, which of course, proved her point and set her off laughing all over again.

“I’m pretty sure I actually owe you, like, a billion. And I really don’t like owing people things,” Bucky said. He looked down into his cup. That was part of the reason he had gotten so deeply and terribly entangled with Alexander in the first place.

Alexander wouldn’t let Bucky completely pay off what he owed to him, sucking him into a cycle of vicious, one-sided dependency.

“You don’t owe me anything. I know you feel bad about the whole nine dollars, but that’s all it was. And this, you don’t owe me for. It’s my job,” Steve insisted. Bucky wanted to say, _‘No, answering the phone and passing my along is your job. What are you doing here? Why do you care? Why do you have to be a hero?’_

Bucky wanted to promise Steve he’d get him back the damn nine dollars and make things square, except Bucky had no grounds to back a promise like that, which made him sink even deeper into mild panic. Nine dollars. Nine fucking dollars.

Bucky said nothing.

“This is super unprofessional but fuck it at this point,” Steve laughed, almost sounding nervous. “You don’t have a place to stay and it’s cold as hell out there. My roommate is out all the time and I got plenty of room.”

Bucky stared. “What?”

Steve fumbled. “If you’d be more comfortable somewhere else, y’know, I’d be happy to drive you, but I know you’re hard on your luck right now and it’d be no skin off my back to have you there-“

Bucky couldn’t believe what he was hearing and he actually started laughing, clearly to Steve’s confusion. “Wow, you take all your work home, or is it just me?”

“It isn’t anything like that and you know it. It’s ten degrees outside. I have a couch and there won’t be anyone but me around most of the time,” Steve continued.

“Your self-preservation instinct is shit, you know that?” Bucky said.

“I’ve heard. But I’m a big guy and I could probably take you in a fight if I had to,” Steve said, trying to use humor to his advantage.

His humor sucked. He was a big fat nerd, but he had pretty eyes and shoulders bigger than Bucky’s head and this illogical drive to help everyone, no matter who. Bucky liked him, he couldn’t help it, which irritated him to no end. He was the kind of guy everyone liked.

“Only until I figure out a place to go,” Bucky finally breathed without looking Steve in the face. He couldn’t believe himself.

It gave him this weird rush that probably wasn’t normal.

Steve’s face brightened. The lines of his body relaxed a little, like Bucky had taken some pressure off of his bones. “Of course. But no rush,” Steve said. He turned the key in the ignition and the vehicle came to life as he strapped his seatbelt.

He looked like a giant sitting in a clown car, Bucky thought. When the car turned on, the MP3 player attached to the radio system flickered to life and crackly music poured out of the old speakers.

_“Strangers in the night exchanging glances, wond’ring in the night what were the chances-“_

Steve hummed a little in time with the slow music as he pulled away from the curb.

“Sinatra? Really?” Bucky scoffed.

“It’s nice,” Steve said with a shrug. “Don’t try and tell me it isn’t kind of pretty.”

“Oh my God, you’re a grandfather,” Bucky said.

“You sound just like Sam. Don’t make fun,” Steve said, turning a dial to tone down the music a little. “You got any stops you need me to make on the way home?”

Bucky shook his head, looking out the window. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

Now that he was out of the cold and had finally stopped moving, Bucky felt the weight of exhaustion on him. The effects of shivering and panicking all day made his limbs heavy, and the frozen city going by outside his window seemed to blur together.

Steve’s apartment was a small but tidy unit in a tall building near the college campus. Bucky felt out of place going into the clean elevator, walking down the neat halls. Steve got his key from on top of his unit’s doorframe and jabbed it into the lock, letting the door swing open.

“Come on in,” Steve said. He went in ahead of Bucky after putting the keys back in their hidden place. Bucky followed a step behind, a little reluctant.

Bucky could tell right away there was a woman who live there as well. The whole place smelled faintly like perfume and there was a good deal of flowery upholstery on the furniture. Steve had said roommate, hadn’t he? Had he?

Bucky tried to think back but his brain wasn’t cooperating and he couldn’t remember if Steve had said roommate or girlfriend.

He caught himself wondering why it even mattered. After all, this was a temporary situation. Very temporary. Bucky would sleep this off and he’d figure out another place to go as fast as he could.

Steve went down a little hall that Bucky assumed led to the bathroom and bedroom. “I’m just getting some blankets,” he said.

Bucky nodded.

He came back with folded sheets and blankets in his arms, changed out of his huge nerdy coat into a ridiculously tight fitting shirt and flannel pajama pants. Bucky tore his eyes away from his massive arms. Christ. If the situation was different, Bucky would want a big piece of that.

“Do you want anything? Eat? Drink? I think Peg’s got Chinese leftovers in the fridge,” he said, snapping a sheet and spreading it over the couch.

“Uh, no. No thank you. You don’t have to do that for me,” Bucky mumbled, picking up the pile of blankets and waving Steve off. They smelled like lavender washer soap. “You’ve done a lot and you look exhausted.”

“It’s not really any trouble. Good hospitality, you know, I was raised a certain way,” Steve said, but he looked grateful. In the light of the apartment, Bucky could see dark circles under Steve’s eyes. “If you change your mind, kitchen’s over there. Help yourself.”

Bucky had no intention of doing so, but he smiled and nodded, unfolding a blanket. “Thank you.”

“Oh, also, bathroom’s that way- don’t use Peg’s hairbrush or she’ll shoot me,” Steve said. He thought Steve was trying to be playful to get Bucky to relax a little, but it wasn’t exactly working. Bucky hadn’t even been thinking about how awful he must look. His hair was yanked back in a messy knot, jaw unshaven, his clothes probably reeked like smoke.

“No problem,” Bucky said.

Steve gave a little salute and headed off to his room, leaving Bucky alone in the living room. Bucky looked around like he still couldn’t quite believe he was standing there. He was in a stranger’s girly living room and Alexander had no idea where he was.

He spread the blankets on the couch and sat down on the soft cushions after taking off his shoes and jacket. Bucky was out like a light before he could even start thinking.

__________

When Bucky woke up, it was later than he’d intended to sleep and very quiet. Bucky remembered where he was, under the blankets, curled up in his clothes still, sleep in his eyes and feeling generally safe. He sat up, slowly rubbing his eyes. He kept the blanket drawn close, looking around.

Sunlight was streaming through the windows. It was maybe near noon. “Steve?” Bucky croaked, wondering if he was maybe just out of sight.

Not knowing where people were made him a little uneasy, but when he got no response, he decided Steve must have slept late, too. After all, he had been out late bringing Bucky home and whatnot.

Bucky’s throat ached and his mouth tasted like stale smoke and hot chocolate. He pulled himself off the couch, reluctantly letting the blankets drop. He folded them back up and left them on the couch.

The floor was cold as he padded toward the bathroom. He pulled the door shut and ran some water, avoiding his reflection the best he could while he washed his face with his hands. He stuck his head under the water and washed his hair, too, before scrunching it back again.

He didn’t have a toothbrush with him but Steve had a bottle of mouth-wash on the lip of the sink so Bucky rinsed his mouth out with some of that and felt generally fresher.

Bucky went out to the kitchen, looking for a clock of some kind. He didn’t dare to check his phone. If it had any battery left, he’d just see all the missed called from Natasha and undoubtedly Alexander.

There was a blinking digital clock on the stove. Bucky sat in one of the wooden-backed chairs, knees tucked up his chest to get his feet off the chilly floor. 11:47 AM.

Then he noticed a box and cup on the table with the orange and pink _Dunkin Donuts_ logo, a little yellow sticky note posted by them. Bucky squinted.

_Sorry to leave you hanging, had to get to class. Breakfast. Hope you like donuts. I don’t know how you take your coffee so I left it black but there’s milk and sugar in the kitchen. See ya later -Steve :)_

Was this for Bucky?

Bucky, as if someone would catch him and tell him to stop, slowly lifted the cardboard lid on the box. It was a half dozen donuts, each one different, like Steve wasn’t sure Bucky would like any of them.

Bucky was so hungry he could swallow his own hand.

The coffee was black, like the note said, but there was a flowery sugar bowl and a spoon out on the counter, milk in the fridge. He could smell the rick steam, the thick icing on the donuts in the cardboard.

He was torn.

Steve spent the time and money getting Bucky breakfast, so it’d be rude to not eat it. But Bucky had some pride, didn’t he? And that meant he should just leave now and not accept any more charity.

 _It ain’t charity, Buck_ , he could almost hear Steve say.

Then on the other hand, Alexander liked Bucky lean. He liked him all muscles, nothing soft. He liked the sharpness of Bucky’s bones, he liked the strength in his muscled arms. When he sent Bucky to do jobs, he liked them done well so he wouldn’t send Bucky out weak, but Alexander always liked to be a little stronger.

So maybe Bucky had a weird relationship with food. He had a hard time telling for himself what was normal anymore, since anything he ate lately was an improvement on the horror years he spent in the depths of an eating disorder.

The last time Bucky saw a donut was maybe a year ago, before his and Alexander’s relationship went sour and strange. Back when they were more relatively normal, Bucky had just been Alexander’s pretty thug boyfriend.

Alexander twisted things, though.

_Getting too big, my boy, too thick to be any good-_

Bucky silenced the echo of Alexander with a big, delicious bite of chocolate donut.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been getting through these chapters so quickly because I've been violently avoiding doing any sort of school work. Summer soon, thank god.
> 
> Feedback, as always, is appreciated.

_Chapter Three_

Sam had time to eat with Steve today so Steve decided it was as good a time as any to try to talk to him about the Bucky situation. Steve didn’t like keeping things to himself and he thought it’d be best to get Sam’s advice now.

Since Steve asked Sam to make him two hot chocolates and then ditched out of work the other night, Sam was a little suspicious that something was going on, anyways, so there was no point beating around the bush or trying to come up with a lie.

So, he’d bought Sam a salad and herded him to a table and spilled his guts, without much looking up while he spoke.

“You mean he’s alone at your place right _now_?” Sam said.

“I know it might sound bad when you put it that way, but—“

_“Oh, when I put it that way—“_

“—But I had to get to class and I wasn’t going to kick him out. Nothing bad will happen, Sam, what’s the worst he’s gonna do? Steal Peggy’s hair curlers?” Steve argued.

Sam gesticulated in exasperation, waving his fork around. “Yes, exactly! He’ll rob you blind and then he won’t be there when you get home and you’ll be all mopey for a month because your stray ran away—”

“That ain’t true, he isn’t gonna rob me, he’s had his chance and—“

Sam’s eyes widened and Steve promptly shut his mouth.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Sam said. When Steve didn’t answer, he knew he’d said more than he should have.

This conversation was not going how Steve intended. He put his hands up in surrender and Sam swatted at him with a napkin across the table. “You better tell me, Rogers, or I swear to God—“

“Okay, okay, it was a little thing. Just— you’re worrying too much. He’s got nothing, Sam. Worst comes to worse, I come out of the whole thing down some silverware but at least I was able to help someone out,” Steve said.

He knew Sam and he knew Sam was fiercely loyal to Steve, but he was a worrier. He was there for Steve when Steve didn’t have much else. He put up with Steve’s clinginess and personality flaws and flighty behavior without ever complaining.

“Don’t pretend like you have any nice silverware, you trashy son of a bitch,” Sam finally muttered, stabbing at his salad with his fork.

“Peggy’s classy, she probably has nice silverware,” Steve countered, before realizing it wasn’t exactly helping his case. Luckily, Sam seemed to miss it.

“Yeah, maybe at What’s-her-face’s house. Does she ever come home anymore?”

“Angie, her name’s Angie— and Peggy does come home. Of course she does,” Steve said defensively. “She just. . . “

“Man, she’s half moved out already. Matter of time, I’m telling you. You just gotta be ready for that, you know,” Sam began, but then realized that Steve had effectively dragged him off topic. “But that isn’t what we’re talking about.”

“Okay, I get it. It was a dumb move on my part, but I don’t regret it and it’s fine so let it go. It’s just until he can get back on his feet. Relax,” Steve reasoned. And it really was. Even if there was something about Bucky that made Steve want to get to know him, that had nothing to do with the help Steve was offering him.

Sam still didn’t look happy. “And it would just be too good if you weren’t hiding this from Peggy? That just wouldn’t be you, huh?”

Steve shrugged sheepishly. “I’ll tell her.”

Sam arched an eyebrow, popping a little tomato into his mouth. Steve could smell the dressing. “Oh yeah? When?”

“I’ll do it, I will, I just don’t want to call and bother her while she’s at Angie’s,” Steve said.

“That’s a dumb excuse, she’s always at Angie’s,” Sam said.

“That’s sort of what I’m counting on,” Steve admitted.

Steve knew Peggy- he knew her well. They went way back. Before Steve’s health improved and he muscled up, he was a lot smaller, a lot dorkier, but Peggy had been his friend even then. They’d even tried out being more than that for a while, but it was cut off before it really began when Steve went off the map for a while when his mom passed.

Then Peggy started dating a girl, and it sort of helped Steve along in the realization that he wasn’t as straight as he’d previously thought.

They were good now, like hardly anything had changed, but that meant when Steve said he knew Peggy, he _really_ knew her. He could almost hear her berating him for leaving a criminal alone in her nice living room without even telling her.

Sam snapped the plastic lid onto his salad container, swiping a couple of napkins from the holder. “Well you’re crazy and I swear you’ll get yourself killed one of these days—“

“But?” Steve interrupted. Sam didn’t look impressed.

“But if there’s anything I can do, y’know you,” he finished with a sigh. He chucked his salad at the trash can.

“Thanks, Sam,” Steve said. He looked a little relieved. He knew he could count on him to be on his side. The thing was, all the bitching Sam did, Steve partly knew he was right. Steve did have a bad tendency to run into situations full-throttle, not thinking about the consequences.

He had this habit of taking on more than he could handle, or getting into fights just because of his principles. He had this nasty hero’s complex, though he’d never admit it, and at the same time, he always felt like he had to prove himself. He felt like he had no point in being around if he wasn't doing anything good. It was like he could somehow give himself some sense of purpose in helping people, even people who didn’t want his help.

That made him start thinking more about Bucky. Yeah, the guy was a grade-A thug, but a kind of sad one with floppy hair and not enough meat on his bones. Steve just had this feeling Bucky wouldn’t do anything bad to him because he already had, and it had been fine.

He felt like he could trust him, stupidly, because the guy had nothing to lose. Besides, Steve was helping him. Something about biting the hand that feeds you, and whatnot.

The guy didn’t seem to want help, but Steve and Bucky both knew he needed a little. Steve would talk to him when he got home and maybe start asking around to find Bucky a job. Steve was just helping him get back on his feet.

Something flickered in the back of Steve’s mind. A little red warning flag. _Just help. Just friends. Nothing else._

Nothing more than getting him back on his feet.

Steve had himself half convinced when he bid Sam goodbye and left the cafeteria for art history. He had a little more spring in his step even though he was only running on a few more hours of sleep. He was going to power through the class and get home and then he and Bucky could talk and Steve could figure out how things were going to go, and everything would be okay.

When Steve approached the lobby of the arts building, the sun was down and the sky was dark dusky blue and streaked with frozen clouds. Ice glistened on the drive, reflecting the flickering yellow light of the building.

But then Steve heard something just around the corner of the building and stopped walking, frowning.

“. . . I told you once, I’ll tell you again, I don’t know where he is, either. Even if I did, I wouldn’t— . . . I’m not covering for him, Pierce, and your threats don’t scare me. . . No— well maybe that’s your own fault—“

Steve frowned. It was a woman’s voice, low and nearly a whisper. There was enough venom in every syllable to kill an elephant. She sounded cold and controlled, though her words indicated something serious was going on.

Was someone missing? Was someone being threatened?

Steve proceeded cautiously, steps a little quieter. Before he even realized what he was doing, he was following his careful feet to eavesdrop. He justified to himself that he was just checking to make sure the woman wasn’t in any danger.

“. . . You’re bluffing. It’s a waste of resources,” the woman said coolly. Steve decided she must be on the phone with someone because he heard a definite lack of another person’s voice. “No, I don’t know you personally, _Alexander_ , but I know your game and I know your type-- _and_  I know your colleagues very personally. . . “

Steve felt a little guilt twist in his stomach, pulse quickening. He shouldn’t be listening and he knew it, but he couldn’t tear his ears away now. It sounded very serious. This wasn’t anything light. Was he getting into more than he could handle?

He came to the corner of the building. Steve tried to muffle his own breath. Guilt and adrenaline pumped through his veins like a magic elixir and he felt like he could jump a mile. Flattening his back to the wall, he very slowly turned his head to try and see.

He saw the cloud of her breath a half second before she came around the corner, running straight into Steve.

“Dammit-“ the woman hissed, knocking backwards slightly and slipping on the ice. Her phone bounced out of her hand and skittered a few feet away on the pavement. Her red hair fell across her features, shaded in the darkness.

The color drained from Steve’s face and he sprung forward, apologies spilling out as he knelt and offered the woman a hand up. She shoved his hand away in irritation, grabbing her phone and bringing herself to her feet.

Her hair moved off of her face and in the dim light of the evening, Steve realized it was Natasha, and if looks could kill, Steve would have dropped dead on the spot.

“Sorry, sorry,” Steve said. “I didn’t mean to-“

“What do you think you’re doing?” Natasha said. If Steve didn’t know any better, he’d say she actually seemed caught off guard.

Steve’s face burned with shame. “Nothing. I didn’t mean to bump into you. Sorry,” he said. It was a transparent lie, but he didn’t have anything to say in explanation beside the obvious. He had been eavesdropping.

Natasha narrowed her eyes, looking Steve over.

Steve looked at her.

“Go inside. We have work to do,” she finally said, tone shifted back to firm indifference. She started walking toward the door and Steve jogged backward in front of her. She wasn’t very big but she was fast and a force to be reckoned with.

“Wait— I just, I have to ask—“

“You really don’t.”

“—Is everything alright?”

Steve’s back bumped into a light post and Natasha kept walking past him without even looking back. She pushed open the heavy door of the arts building and disappeared inside without another work to Steve.

Steve was left standing in the cold, shivering and wondering what kind of hurricane was bottled up inside that lady.

He went into the lecture hall. Natasha was sitting in her usual place by the back door with her computer out and a focused expression on her face, wordlessly working as Steve set his things down. She looked tired, still.

Steve began to open his mouth to say something, but she cut him off without even looking up.

“Don’t.”

So he didn’t, even though he had a bad feeling in his stomach and felt some sense of obligation. He worried that something bad might happen, that Natasha was entangled in something bad. Then Steve realized he couldn’t actually do anything, and she seemed tough enough to hold her own. Still, it went against his morals.

He made it all the way through the period without talking to her, independently working. It was hard for Steve to focus on the words on the page when his mind was racing and he had a thick lump in his throat from worrying. Then, when it was time to go, as everyone filed out of the door, Steve stopped her.

“Look, I know wasn’t supposed to hear you and I really am sorry for listening, but I just need to make sure everything is okay,” he said hastily. There was no point in keeping up any pretense that Steve had only overheard by accident. He’d done something wrong by eavesdropping and he wasn’t going to lie about it.

He was stood between her and the back door while she methodically closed her laptop and notebooks, not really blocking the door, but hoping to slow her down a little.

“You don’t need to, actually, but everything’s fine.”

“You were— saying something about someone being missing? Have you called the police?” Steve said. Natasha looked up suddenly with sharp eyes and the bags under her eyes looked deep.

“You don’t know what I was talking about. You have no idea. So keep away from it, or else.”

She slid her things into her back and walked past Steve, roughly knocking her shoulder against him even though he was twice as big as her at least. Steve didn’t watch her go. He heard her steady footsteps and the click of the backdoor and the rush of cold air as it opened and shut.

__________

When Steve got home, Bucky was in his same clothes as before but he looked a little less like a zombie. His hair and face were clean and the smell of cigarette smoke was mostly gone. On his way home, Steve had grabbed a pack of cheap disposable roars and a toothbrush from a convenient store to give to Bucky later.

He seemed to have a little color in his cheeks and two donuts were missing from the case, to Steve’s delight. He’d been worried that Bucky would be reluctant to eat Steve’s food and whatnot and he was glad to see he had eaten.

Bucky was sitting cross-legged on one of Steve’s wooden chairs, hunched over a newspaper spread out over the table. Peggy had a subscription to local news that got delivered each morning. Steve usually brought it in and saved it for her, even though it usually piled up pretty high before she ever got around to reading any of it.

“Hey,” Steve said when he came into the kitchen, not wanting to startle him.

Bucky jumped a little, blinking his hooded eyes up at Steve and pushing a loose piece of hair behind his ears. Steve tried not to think about it, but Bucky sort of looked cute with his hair back in a messy bun, curled up in the chair like a kid.

He ignored the flush that came to his cheeks.

“Hey,” Bucky said back. He sat upright tentatively, like he had been caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to. Steve glanced down at the newspaper. He saw that it was open to the job listings page.

Steve dumped his backpack on the counter, not disturbing Bucky’s papers, and sat down across the table from him. He began the process of getting his shoes off. “Hope you liked breakfast and found your way around today?” Steve said conversationally.

“Yeah, thanks. You didn’t have to do that for me. The whole room-service breakfast deal,” Bucky said. He seemed tenser now that Steve was in the room.

“Stop saying that. I know I don’t have to. Just wanted to,” Steve said. He shrugged and stretched out when his shoes came off, letting out a deep sigh. His muscles ached.

It was really important to him that Bucky understood he wasn’t any kind of burden, but Steve could tell from the start that Bucky wouldn’t stop believing that if they knew each other a hundred years.

“I won’t be here long,” Bucky said, eyes flicking down to the job listens again. Steve reached for the pen cup by the microwave and set it in front of Bucky so he could circle things if he wanted. Bucky glanced up and his face softened a little.

“I figured, but still, you’re welcome as long as you need. Anything good in the listings?” Steve said. That was a tactic he learned at the call center— _divert attention from feelings of panic or despair to a more constructive conversation._

He was trying his damn best here.

Bucky nodded. “There’s work in a bar near here,” he said. He reached absentmindedly into the pen cup and ended up circling an ad with a pen with a pink, feathery end that Angie had left here when she visited.

“Ever worked in one before?” Steve asked. He moved to chuck his shoes at the front door, going for the fridge.

“Sure, sure. I do good with night work,” Bucky said. He circled another ad, licking his thumb and turning the page. He squinted at the tiny print.

“Really? I do nights at the call center,” Steve said. He pulled out a carton of chocolate milk and a box of cold pizza, one handedly pouring a cup while he poked at the microwave. The smell of tomato and melting cheese filled the kitchen. “It’s hard for me to stay awake sometimes but I’d rather have my days free to do the stuff I like, you know?”

Bucky got a sort of distant expression like he didn’t really do much that he liked at all and that made Steve sad. “Yeah, I understand that.”

The microwave beeped and Steve pulled out the plate. It burned the tips of his fingers but he set it on the table, yelping. “Here. Sorry it’s nothing special,” he said. He stuck his burnt finger in his mouth while he grabbed another plate and grabbed a slice of pizza.

Bucky looked at the pizza. His eyes looked a little glassy. “Thanks,” he said.

Steve took a bite of hot pizza. It wasn’t cool yet and burned his tongue but he forced it down. “Oh, I’ve got some stuff you can wear, too. They might be a little big on you, but then you’ll have spare clothes to sleep in and for job interviews or whatever.”

Bucky was still looking at the pizza in a funny way so Steve decided to leave him alone a while. He continued, “Anyways, I’ll leave that on the couch for you and leave you to it. I’ll be studying in my room just down the hall if you need anything.”

Bucky nodded absently.

Steve took his pizza and left him alone in the kitchen, heading through the living room. He paused halfway to his bedroom, remembering what Sam had said about Bucky robbing him. Guiltily, Steve backed up a little and glanced around the living room. It seemed like everything was in place.

The blankets were even folded up on the end of the couch.

Immediately, Steve felt his face heat up like he was sneaking around or something and went to his bedroom. He tore off a huge bite of pizza and got his phone out to drop Sam a text.

_‘Nothing’s missing and Bucky’s still here looking for a job. He even folded his blankets. Looks like manners aren’t dead :) -SR’_

He chuckled at himself and set the phone on his desk, getting out a set of flash cards to study, chewing on his pizza crust. Steve got halfway through the deck when his phone buzzed. Sam had replied.

_‘Whatever you say, gramps. -SW’_

There was nothing old fashioned about a little good manners, Steve thought. He sent back a couple of emojis and then silenced his phone so he could focus on his work, trying not to think about Bucky in his kitchen.

The house felt less lonely.

__________

Bucky ended up eating a slice of the pizza, after thinking about it for a long time. The smell filled the whole kitchen and he wasn’t able to focus on the blurry newsprint, hypnotized by the scent.

Pizza and donuts in one day. Who would have thought.

_You shouldn’t be eating like that, James, and you know I only say it for your own good-_

He ate it slowly, chewing each bite a long time, enjoying the taste. He didn’t want to overwhelm his stomach while he was adjusting to eating this much in one day. That morning, he’d snarfed down two donuts before he could blink and felt sick for half the day. He’d be more careful from now on.

He chased it down with water from the tap and carefully washed his hands so not to get pizza grease on the newspaper that didn’t belong to him.

Nothing belonged to him. It was a thought that used to motivate him. Then, it faded to a general feeling of shame. Now, Bucky could barely remember what it was like to have pride and he knew that if he would have ever known he’d come out this way, living in a land of borrowed things, not to touch, he’d be disgusted with himself.

He looked over the page, marked up with ideas. Bucky would work in a bar. Easy. He’d work nights, make decent money. He’d be right at home. No one would think twice about him unless he wanted attention, then he could easily get it. That was perfect because sometimes Bucky needed a lot of attention.

Usually Alexander could supply but Bucky was cutting himself off from him. He couldn’t take that poison in his life anymore.

By the end of the night, he was actually feeling kind of positive. Things were turning up, at least a little. He changed into Steve’s too-big pajamas— well worn flannel with cartoon characters. Steve had left Bucky a toothbrush and disposable razor with the clothes, so Bucky actually cleaned up nicely before tucking in on the couch.

He laid flat on his back, staring at a water stain on the ceiling.

A night ago he’d been ready to kill himself. Now wasn’t so bad, at least in comparison. He was sleeping on a stranger’s couch but it was a nice stranger with gorgeous muscles who fed him donuts. He’d interview for a job in a day or so, start bringing home his own money.

Things could turn up for him.

Of course, he was buzzing a little, itching for a fix of something. To get knockout drunk or high out of his skull or beat around or something to get out of his head, just to go blank a moment. That was part of his problem. Bucky liked to disappear sometimes and Alexander made it so easy for Bucky to be gone have the time without ever going anywhere.

Like on cue, Bucky heard his text tone coming from inside his backpack on the coffee table. And another.

He wasn’t sure how many messages must have accumulated while he wasn’t looking, but he could guess it was a lot. He decided to read them now while he was in at least okay shape.

Several were from Alexander. Bucky skipped over those at first to read the messages from Natasha. Those ones started a few days back.

_‘James, how are things? Drinks tonight? I have a headache from idiots in my art history class -Nat’_

_‘Hello? Drinks? Yes, no? -Nat’_

_‘Morning. You never answered last night. How rude of you to make me drink alone. >:( -Nat’_

‘ATTACHED JPG _Look at this guy I saw in the bar. He’s your type, yes? :) -Nat’_

_‘Answer me. -Nat’_

_‘James this isn’t funny. -Nat’_

Then, there were the most recent messages. Those were from tonight.

_‘Pierce called me. What the hell is going on? You better not be dead in a ditch, I’ll kill you. -Nat’_

_‘Bucky what the fuck what’s going on? -Nat’_

Bucky scrolled through, guilt like a stone in his stomach. Not only guilt for making Natasha worry, but because Alexander called her. That was exactly what he’d been hoping to prevent in avoiding her. He didn’t want Alexander or any of his creepy friends anywhere near her.

Like Rumlow or Ivan or the others from the Red Room. It was a sort of strip club, sort of drug den, sleazy mess with enough enemies that they had a real violent bunch surrounding the place. It had a strictly defined hierarchy with a lot of sad junkie prostitutes at the bottom and terrifying guys like Rumlow keeping them in line.

Natasha had gotten out and Bucky wanted it to stay that way.

He owed her a phone call now, at least.

He pushed his blankets off and padded out of bed with his phone. It was late and he didn’t want to disturb Steve talking on the phone. He went out onto the fire escape into the cold and lit his last cigarette out of habit as he dialed her number.

His hands were shaking, more from nerves than anything.

“James, I swear to God—“ Natasha said right when she picked up the phone.

“Wow, hello to you, too, old friend,” Bucky said sarcastically, taking a long drag on his cigarette. Using sarcasm as a mask was easy for Bucky, like falling on a sturdy crutch. Natasha didn’t grace his bitching with any sort of acknowledgement.

“Where the hell are you? Are you alright? I was afraid you were dead,” she hissed.

“Not dead,” Bucky said. “I’m just away.”

“Away? Where? Are you at the Red Room? At home? Outside? I’m coming to get you,” Natasha said. Bucky could hear her moving around, getting car keys and zipping a jacket.

“Woah, woah, slow down. I’m fine, serious. I’m staying at someone’s house, don’t go rushing out,” Bucky said quickly.

“Someone’s house? Who?”

She had a good right to sound suspicious. Bucky didn’t always keep good company. She knew because she had the same problem. Of course, Natasha was strong enough to stop being a victim while Bucky let himself become less and less anyone he recognized.

“A friend,” Bucky said through clenched teeth. He wouldn’t tell her that it was a perfect stranger or she’d come and pick him up, and Alexander would know to look for Bucky there and she’d be in the mess of things all over and everything would be bad.

Besides, maybe it wasn’t a complete lie. He’d only known Steve a few days but they seemed to get on pretty well, all things considered. Bucky was a bitch and loitered at his house and Steve was chirpy and bought him donuts. That counted as friendship, right?

He was trying to justify himself in his own head for no reason and he had a general feeling like he was going to vibrate out of his own skin. He wanted a drink. A couple pills. A three day nap—

“You don’t have friends,” Natasha said.

“Hurtful,” Bucky feigned. “I’m fine. I only called so you’d stop blowing up my phone.”

“Don’t drop off the planet next time. Keep me updated,” she said, sounding less than pleased.

“Yeah, okay. No problem.”

He hung up before she could demand anything else and quietly finished his cigarette on the fire escape in the cold night before he dared to listen to any of Alexander’s voicemails.

There was a beeping sound and the message began.

“I hope you’re safe, James. You aren’t safe away from me. Don’t be stupid. Come home and I’ll be gentle, or else—“

Bucky couldn’t listen to much more of the sound of that voice until he threw up over the edge of the fire escape, dropping his cigarette in the snow and turning his phone off.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve was helping him and Bucky sure couldn’t do it alone, but he was taking the steps to becoming his own again. As the Steve’s headlights became visible coming around the corner, Bucky pictured Alexander’s face if he knew how well Bucky was doing and smiled, breathing out a long string of smoke.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay in posting-- school just got out for the summer and I was finishing up finals and what not. Thanks for all the comments and support! I like the direction the story is taking me and I hope you do as well.
> 
> Tags have been updated for flashback to the Red Room.

_Chapter Four_

_Like a ghost, Bucky felt detached from his own body. He was a whisper of a ghost with disconnected sensations. Sounds were from another world away, distant and hazy like underwater. He wished everything would stop spinning._

_He was in the Red Room. He wasn’t lying when he’d said he had experience working in bars, but he was always purposely ambiguous about the actual work he did. He’d started out pouring drinks but Alexander had bigger ideas for Bucky._

_A customer had given Bucky the drug and Bucky had taken it. He thought it was just a downer but he hadn’t exactly asked, and now he knew something hurt— everything hurt— but he felt disconnected from the pain, like he couldn’t quite tell where it was coming from._

_He’d been giving a half hearted lap dance and now he was laying on a table in the shadows in the corner of the room and there were hands on him, faces hovering above him. Everyone’s movement were disjointed and stuttered, like a rolling movie shown at the wrong frame rate._

_Bucky wanted to protest, to make them leave him alone. He was too strung out to make words, though. Couldn’t they see he was going to float out of his own body if they shook him too hard? Couldn’t they see that something was wrong?_

_When he parted his lips to speak, a garbled, alien voice came out. No real words, just a drawn out noise of despair._

_Laughter, distant and muted._

_Then, the faces cleared away and Bucky’s addled brain recognized some commotion. Someone yanked a couple of the men away and stood over Bucky. His figure shadowed Bucky from the flashing neon lights in the club and Bucky couldn’t make out much more than a hazy silhouette._

_Like underwater, he heard the man speak. “My beautiful boy, what have you done to yourself?” he said with a chuckle._

_“A’zander,” Bucky slurred in recognition._

_“Mhm,” he said, gently lifting Bucky up. Bucky felt light and proud as he was lifted like a child— Light as a feather, aren’t you pleased?— but the movement made the spinning go faster and he wished it would stop._

_“Sorry,” Bucky mumbled, mind slowly turning. He was supposed to be entertaining, lap dances and flirting with customers and pouring drinks. Sometimes stripping, but he was clumsy on the pole so not often. But he was supposed to being doing his job and he’d messed up what if he was in trouble? He was able to worry about that, even in his state._

_“Shh, shh. We’ll go home,” Alexander said. Bucky didn’t understand why he was grinning, but he looked pleased despite Bucky getting high on the job. How could he explain that he didn’t want to— he didn’t mean to— he hadn’t expected this to happen._

_A sense of urgency keeping him awake, he tried to explain himself but no real words seemed to come out. He didn’t want to be punished for this but when he tried to apologize more, all that came out was a string of slurred together mumblings that only caused him to further panic. His breath was hitched and uneven._

_Bucky seemed to blink and he was in the back of the car. Blinked again and he was being carried along into Alexander’s apartment. Was Rumlow around? Bucky would be sick on the floor if he saw him right now— sometimes Alexander delegated punishments to him to maintain his status as the good guy but it was a transparent trick that Bucky picked up on quickly._

_But the apartment was empty and Alexander wasn’t getting out anything to hurt Bucky with. He brought him to the bed and gently took his shoes off and pulled up the covers and Bucky realized maybe it would be one of those good nights where he’d be sweet and kind._

_The kind of man Bucky perhaps might like if he didn’t know how terrible he could be._

_Alexander pushed Bucky’s hair out of his eyes. “I’m so disappointed in you, James,” he said quietly. “You’re a disappointment. I’m only telling you for your own good. But I’m not mad.”_

_“‘M sorry—“_

_“Sh, shhh,” Alexander said. His sharp eyes seemed to twinkle in the dark. Moonlight cut through the window and fell onto the bed in sideways, slanted shafts, casting a warped shape of the window across them. “I’m not mad. Just disappointed in you. You know I deserve better than you but I won’t make you leave.”_

_The way he twisted it, Bucky almost could forget that he didn’t want to stay. Of course he wanted to stay. He had to. He needed the high, he needed the pain, he needed someone to want him. He was so strung out he could hardly form coherent thoughts but the words hit Bucky almost harder than a blow._

_Disappointment._

_It made Bucky want to be better, even though he wasn’t sure anymore what that meant._

__________

Bucky looked like a dead man in the car. His head kept drooping like he was a moment from sleep and he’d already nearly drained his coffee cup. Steve was focused on driving, but he kept glancing over at him, slumped in the front seat.

“You sure you’re okay?” Steve asked, biting his tongue.

“‘M fine. You already asked,” Bucky said. He was watching out the window so Steve couldn’t see his face beside the translucent reflection on the glass. He looked sad, brooding. Steve had been trying to make conversation for a while but Bucky kept shutting him down. Of course, Steve had never been great at learning when to give it up.

“You just seem really tired. I could stop and get you some more coffee— there’s still time, I think, if I go fast—“

“I’m really fine, pal. Just didn’t sleep great,” Bucky said.

Steve tried to force himself to just shut up and drive, but he was having a hard time of it. He already knew that Bucky didn’t sleep well. In the night, he’d heard the guy sort of mumbling in his sleep when Steve got up for a glass of water. He’d had this look on his face like he was pinned down, eyebrows scrunched up and face shining with sweat.

Steve wondered what kind of bad things he had locked up in his head.

“Sorry,” Steve said dumbly. Bucky shifted a little and eyed Steve sideways, letting out a soft sigh. Steve made a point of looking straight ahead and pretending not to see, but Bucky’s expression had changed.

“God, don’t apologize. Anyone ever told you you’re too nice for your own good?” Bucky finally grumbled, reaching for his coffee in the cup holder and downing the last few swallows. He sounded bitchy and tired, but there was an ounce of sincerity in his voice that was almost unsettling.

“No such thing as too nice,” Steve said with a little crooked smile. “But I’ll tell you, you sound just like my roommate.”

“You must drive her crazy, bringing random people home,” Bucky said.

Steve waved him off. “I’ve never done this before. Once I brought a bird home, though. That went over well.”

“A bird?”

“Like, a pigeon. It had a messed up foot and me and Sam didn’t know what to do with it so we brought it back to the apartment and took care of it,” Steve said. He smiled while he spoke, thinking back. It was a good memory.

They’d named it Captain and turns out, while it couldn’t walk well, it could sure try to fly. It crashed around the kitchen knocking things down while Steve and Sam frantically tried to catch it, the two men jumping around like bulls in a china shop.

Sam had commandeered the whole project half an hour in, insisting Steve was hurting it when they finally caught it. He spoon fed the thing right at the kitchen table. It liked Sam better than Steve which Sam never let Steve hear the end of.

“A pigeon. You nursed a pigeon back to health,” Bucky repeated in disbelief. “Of course you did. Don’t you know birds are covered in diseases?”

Steve rolled his eyes. “Now you _really_ sound like her. Gosh, you two will get along well.”

At least, Steve hoped they’d get along well. She wouldn’t be home for another day still and Steve was still trying to think about how to tell her. Today he didn’t have class so he had spent the morning cleaning up the apartment a little while Bucky got dressed for his interview at the bar.

He’d called and set up a meeting and then got showered and dressed. Steve definitely didn’t do a double take when Bucky passed through the living room in nothing but a towel, skin glistening with drops of water, hair damp and around his face.

He definitely didn’t stare at the tattoos on his arm.

Bucky seemed a little tenser at the mention of Peggy, though, so Steve dropped it. He cut a corner and pulled into the parking lot outside of a bar. It was late but not quite opening time yet. The owner had scheduled Bucky an interview as soon as he could, and even though Bucky had insisted on walking, Steve wanted to give him a ride. For good luck, he’d tried to say. Really, he just wanted to keep him out of the cold.

It wasn’t a long drive but Steve didn’t think it’d be a pleasant walk, anyways. Why walk when he didn’t need to?

“Here we are,” Steve said, cutting the engine. He looked over at Bucky. On the surface, Bucky looked at ease. His face was steady and his posture relaxed, but his knuckles were white, clutching the coffee cup like an anchor.

“Great. Thanks for the ride,” Bucky said. He popped his seatbelt undone and set the cup in the cup holder. “Not sure when I’ll be done here but don’t wait up in case they want me to start tonight.”

“Wait, do you have my number in your phone?” Steve said.

Bucky gave him a look. “Why?”

“You can just call me when you’re done and I’ll come get you,” Steve said, watching Bucky’s expression shift to sour.

“I appreciate everything but you don’t have to hold my hand. I can walk just fine, pal,” he said, throwing the car door open. A gust of cold air rushed in and Steve felt a chill run up his spine.

Steve recoiled, a bad taste in his mouth. “Yeah, okay. Sorry.”

He didn’t mean to push himself on Bucky and he didn’t mean to be condescending. He just wanted to help, but instead, here he was, making things worse. Like always.

Bucky opened his mouth but didn’t say anything. The car door shut loudly and Steve watched him disappear into the bar, hands jammed into the pockets of his hoodie. Steve stayed in the parking lot a moment, quiet.

Another gust of wind shook the sign hanging outside the bar, and with it came a swirl off dusty snow. The sky seemed to open and soil out it’s white stuffing. Pulling out of the parking lot, Steve thought to himself that he hoped Bucky would change his mind and call for a ride. He would be buried in snow.

It was totally normal— no one deserved to be stranded in a blizzard. Steve would do the same for anyone. Wouldn’t he?

He got home and unlocked the front door, kicking his boots off by the welcome mat. Sighing and running a cold hand through his hair, he flung his coat over the back of the couch. His fingertips were numb from the drive because his car was old and sometimes the heater gave up on him.

He went into the kitchen, intending to make himself a hot cup of coffee to warm his bones but he was met by a sharp, “Ahem.”

Startled, Steve looked up to see Peggy leaning on the counter, Bucky’s ragged backpack dangling from her hand and one eyebrow arched. Her hair was neat but her lipstick was smudged, bleeding cherry red at one corner of her mouth. Her eyes were sharp watching Steve, but she didn’t look angry. Just watching.

“I was going to call you,” Steve began before she could even ask. “But I didn’t want to bother you and I was afraid you’d say ‘no’.”

“I assume there’s someone staying here, then? I didn’t go through the bag but I’m fairly certain it isn’t Sam’s,” she said.

“He needed a place to go and I didn’t know what else to do,” Steve said. He already sounded defensive.

“Easy, soldier,” Peggy said. Steve realized he was tensed up, muscles stiff, back tight. “It’s okay, I just wish you would’ve called.”

Letting his muscles relax, Steve slouched a little. He didn’t know why he’d been so apprehensive. Peggy wasn’t a monster. But, Steve knew she liked order around the house and he’d been expecting her to be upset.

“If it helps, he’s at a job interview right now. He’s a good guy. He really is trying to get on his feet,” Steve said.

“You don’t need to try convincing me, I’ve already told you it’s okay,” she said. “You’re reckless but you wouldn’t do anything that’d do me harm. I trust you.”

It was like she knew somehow that Steve was feeling stupidly protective over Bucky. It didn’t make any sense to him but it was there and he couldn’t change it. He just wanted him to be okay and Peggy seemed to understand that. She always did seem to understand Steve.

“Thanks, Peg,” he said.

“Coffee?” she asked when Steve slid into a kitchen chair, holding his head in one arm as if too tired to support it himself. He flicked his eyes up, giving her a grateful expression. “I’ll take that as a yes. So how’ve you been?”

She reached into the cupboards for two of her nice dining cups with the delicate little handles. Peggy was studying to become a forensic investigator so she took rigorous science and psychology classes, but she’d always had a soft spot for pottery and the kitchenware in the apartment reflected it.

They had their share of strange, mismatched dishes or unusable decorative plates. From early on in her adventure into pottery, they had at least a dozen ugly, hand-painted mugs and bowls so lumpy and uneven that they could have been made by a preschooler.

Now, she could make clean cut, elegant dishes. Her pottery classes and studio time was like her stress relief, and it was how she met Angie. Being friends with Peggy meant new dishes for Christmas and your birthday— every year time.

“I’ve been fine,” Steve said as Peggy poured two cups of coffee and set them on the table. While Steve went for big spoonfuls of sugar and a splash of cream, she sipped hers black, sitting across the table from Steve with her ankles crossed beneath her chair.

“You look exhausted,” Peggy said. Her lipstick left red prints on the lip of her cup. “And— now, I’m not nagging— the apartment is a mess.”

“Sorry,” Steve said. When he deemed his coffee unrecognizable enough to drink, he took a sip. It was too sweet and not milky enough. He could never get it right. Sam knew Steve’s coffee better than Steve did. “It’s been a little crazy, I guess. We’re having finals and I haven’t cleaned much since Bucky came.”

“Bucky?”

“Oh, yeah, that’s his name. It must be short for something but he hasn’t told me,” Steve said with a shrug. Peggy was looking at Steve with a strange expression, though.

“So you’ve been distracted,” she said slowly. What was she getting at? “With _Bucky_.”

Oh. Steve felt a heat crawl up his neck despite himself and he scowled. “Not anything like that, gosh. I wouldn’t take advantage of him like that—“

But then he realized Peggy hadn’t even said anything and Steve had said too much. The implications hung heavy between them and Peggy looked delighted. Steve buried his face in his hands. He set his coffee cup down a little too hard and little droplets jumped out onto the table. He ran his hands through his hair, groaning.

“Like what? I haven’t said anything. But you’re thinking it, aren’t you?” she said, smiling and poking Steve in the ribs.

“Stop,” he groaned. “I just thought you meant—“

“I know what you thought. I’m only teasing,” she said, although the smeared-lipstick grin didn’t leave her face. Steve wanted to bury his head in the sand.

“Yeah, okay, that’s enough teasing,” he mumbled.

“But is he good looking?” she said. It was clear that she was most certainly not done teasing and Steve only hoped she’d cut it out when Bucky came back. She didn’t know what he was like— Steve thought he probably had a good sense of humor under all of his cynicism but he wasn’t comfortable around Steve yet and he didn’t want Peggy to spoil it by making him uncomfortable.

“I— I don’t know. Christ,” Steve muttered. If he said ‘no’, he was lying. If he said ‘yes’, it’d only give Peggy more ammunition.

“He is, isn’t he?”

“If I say yes, will you leave me alone?”

“No.”

“Gah,” he groaned. He sat up and tipped back his coffee cup. He needed the perk up. “You’re awful, you know that, _Carter_?”

“Whatever you say, _Rogers_ , my girlfriend thinks I’m hilarious,” she said smugly.

“Well she would. You look like a clown,” he said, pointing to her lipstick where it was smudged. She must have come directly from Angie’s house because Peggy never went out without checking and double checking her lipstick.

She frowned, pulling out a compact mirror. She dabbed the smudge gently away with the corner of a napkin. “I bet you’d like _Bucky_ to smear your lipstick,” Peggy said.

When Steve realized she wasn’t wrong, he wanted to sink through the floor. It didn’t matter who Bucky was, how closed up or snarky, or how little they actually knew each other— none of that changed his pink, pouty lips that Steve had a desperately hard time not noticing, or the spark of strength in everything he did.

Peggy took the delay in responding as a victory. She smugly snapped the compact shut, drinking the last of her coffee and grinning at Steve. Her expression softened but only slightly when she realized he looked genuinely embarrassed. God, that wasn’t helping. He wished he was good at keeping his composure. Peggy had a killer poker face and she always kept an unreadable posture, where Steve was an unfortunate open book.

“Hey,” she said, putting a finger beneath Steve’s chin to tip his head up so he was forced to look at her. “He’d be lucky to smear your lipstick. Understood?”

“Yeah, whatever you say, Peg,” he sighed. She sounded sincere and it made it all worse. Steve’s petty crush aside, she was a good friend and knew him too well not to know how to help him feel better.

“Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a paper to write,” she said, moving her finger to swiftly bop Steve on the tip of the nose, leaving the kitchen with the sound of clicking heels and a satisfied chuckle.

__________

He got the job. It wasn’t a surprise to Bucky, but it was certainly a relief. It would be two weeks before he got his first check but he fully intended to give it to Steve as sort of rent until he had some savings built up to leave.

He started work Monday. Steve had insisted on giving him a ride again, after a celebratory breakfast of toaster waffles with sliced strawberries and hot coffee. Bucky also got to meet Peggy, Steve’s lovely roommate with sharp lipstick and a sharper tongue.

Bucky thought she had a sort of strong, non bullshit presence. When she entered a room, all attention was drawn to her and she held herself like she stood a foot above everyone else. She commanded respect in a way Bucky admired.

He didn’t understand her relationship with Steve, though. They seemed very close with one another but they lived in the same house with each other but Bucky didn’t detect anything romantic between them.

It just didn’t make sense to him.

Plus, they were both unbearably attractive. That was the half of the truth that was harder to acknowledge— how could Peggy live in the house with Steve without wanting anything more with him? Bucky hardly knew Steve and he started having a problem keeping his eyes off of him.

To be fair, Peggy was just as beautiful. She had a jawline that rivaled Steve’s or Bucky’s and everything about her was sharply neat. She was powerful and clever.

But Peggy, unlike Steve, Bucky had no problem being around. He could appreciate the fact that she was aesthetically pleasing and that she had a killer personality without feeling distracted or flustered by it. Steve was another story entirely.

For most of their interactions, Bucky kept himself jaded with sarcasm and cynicism to hide the fact that he was undyingly grateful to Steve for everything. He hid his admiration of Steve’s unrealistic kindness. The fact that looking at Steve was like staring into the damn sun.

It was hard not to like him when everything he did dripped with sincerity and honesty. Bucky felt like he’d believe in ghosts if Steve said they were real, because Steve was the kind of guy who wouldn’t and couldn’t tell a lie to save his own life. He was honor and morals and all sorts of things that Bucky wasn’t.

Bucky knew how liars and a manipulators and selfish people worked, but Steve Rogers was something Bucky had no idea how to deal with.

 

Bucky worked nights like Steve so they both slept during the day for the days they worked. Peggy had classes during the day and slept at night when Steve and Bucky worked, and half the time she wasn’t home. Bucky wasn’t sure where she went when he went away for days at a time, but she always came back in a pleasant mood.

Because of that, he rarely saw her beside an occasional word exchanged on someone’s way in or out. They weren’t friends but shared a mutual respect they got along fine.

Usually, Bucky would wake up before Steve and make a pot of coffee while he showered and got ready for a shift at the bar. Steve would wake up and come into the kitchen, hair mussed and eyes still cloudy with his dreams.

Every damn day he’d act so surprised and grateful that Bucky fixed coffee and every damn day he’d pour out sleepy words of thanks and appreciation with his face in a mug, looking at Bucky like he hung the star in the sky.

Bucky would try not to think anything of that because that was just the way Steve was— it wasn’t that Bucky was anything special. Steve just saw the good in everyone. He was one of those people too good to even exist.

He’d take Bucky to work on his way into the call center and pick him up on the way home, and Bucky worked hard.

The bar was big and crowded at night and it was understaffed, but he earned his money. The work took his mind off anything else and it was good to feel like he was doing something beside sleeping on someone’s couch. Busy hands meant a quiet mind and Bucky needed the reprieve.

Of course, on this schedule, he and Steve had a lot of time to talk. Bucky focused on avoiding major conversations— he didn’t need to get any more of a crush on the guy, and besides, there wasn’t much about Bucky’s life he was really ready to share about himself. Steve was kind and generous and compassionate but there were some things about Bucky that even Steve couldn’t forgive. He was sure of it.

But Bucky made the mistake of letting the little jokes and laughs and friendly greetings slip through his fingers.

He was so deadset on avoiding major talk that he didn’t think much of the Steve greeting Bucky after a long night of work with badly delivered shitty jokes his friend Sam told him. Bucky didn’t count on Steve telling long stories about getting in fights when he was a kid, or about when he and Peggy first met or about his first dog or anything while Bucky helped wash dishes on his nights off.

Then, before he realized it, his walls were slipping and he wasn’t nearly as guarded all the time. He had a closet full of more skeletons than he could count, but he felt comfortable around Steve, and even Peggy. He stopped thinking about Alexander half as much, and he was eating regularly without feeling fat afterward.

He didn’t notice himself becoming closer to whole again but it was happening.

Before he knew it, Bucky’s first paycheck came to him. His boss, a funny guy named Clint, put a stupid smiley face sticker on the envelope with his pay in it. “You earned it, man,” he’d said.

Bucky leaned on the bike rack outside of the bar, watching the earliest hints of light seep across the cloudy sky like watercolors bleeding together. He’d bummed a smoke off a coworker and worked at it now, flicking ash while he waited for Steve.

The weight of the envelope in his hand was like a giddy relief. It was good for him to feel like he was actually contributing. He was on his way to feeling like he could have some pride again, some self respect. Bucky was doing this. It wasn’t anyone else pulling him out of the mud.

Steve was helping him and Bucky sure couldn’t do it alone, but he was taking the steps to becoming his own again. As the Steve’s headlights became visible coming around the corner, Bucky pictured Alexander’s face if he knew how well Bucky was doing and smiled, breathing out a long string of smoke.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This was what Bucky had been trying to avoid. Despite himself, he cared.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this one is angsty lol have fun

_Chapter Five_

Steve just had a feeling when he went into work that it would be a bad night. There was no real reason for it beside an unsettling wrongness when he came through the doors. It was like something bad was going to happen and already he felt useless to stop it.

His anxiety had been acting up lately anyways and this wasn't helping it. When he got like this, he'd pick at Peggy and Bucky about stupid things and double check the locks at night and pace and worry. He knew he wasn't much fun to be around and he wished he could avoid himself.

"Rogers, nice shirt," Sam said when Steve passed his cubicle, winking and pointing at his ratty cotton Star Trek t-shirt. He and Sam had bought matching ones a couple years ago and now it was something like a security item for Steve. He wore it as pajamas or on bad days.

"Thanks, it's from a friend," Steve said with a smile, dumping his bag on his desk, trying to ignore the pit in his stomach. It was just anxiety, he tried to tell himself. _Everything will be fine, sometimes your body thinks it's in danger when it isn't. You're fine, you're going to be okay._

"A beautiful amazing friend, probably. Am I right? I am right," Sam said. If he noticed Steve seeming on edge, he was making a choice not to say anything about it. Sam was a good friend and he knew when Steve needed help versus when he just needed a distraction.

"Well he sure thinks a lot of himself, but you'd already know," Steve said. "Tell me you've got coffee for me."

"No can do, Cap'n," Sam said. The whole call center smelled like a mixture of coffee, hand sanitizer and musty carpeting. Caffeine was in high demand amongst the late night phone operators.

Steve frowned. Sam always had coffee for him. "Why? Is the breakroom out of k-cups again?" he asked. "Is there going to be another caffeine employee strike? Good God, it's last Christmas all over again."

"Very funny. They keep it well stocked after that," Sam said. He chewed his lip.

"Then what?" Steve said.

Sam shrugged. "You really think you need coffee? You're wired, man. You look like you're going to vibrate outta your skin."

Steve waved him off, even though he knew it was true if he looked anything like how he felt. "I'm fine. Just a little jittery."

"Anxiety acting up?"

"I guess so," Steve said, looking away from Sam. He tapped his pencil on the edge of his desk. "It's no reason to deprive me. I don't want to fall asleep."

"Give it an hour," Sam said, light but firm. Out of anyone Steve knew, Sam was the only one who really seemed to understand Steve when he got anxious or depressed, and he was the only one who did anything to make Steve deal with it.

Steve could be thoughtful and kind and the best caretaker in the world for other people, but he wasn't so good at self maintenance. He wasn't good at knowing what he needed or giving it to himself and he was shitty at recognizing when he was putting himself in a bad situation. He had a bad tendency to carry too much around on him. He held himself responsible for everything.

Sam, thankfully, learned Steve's ticks and yanked him along on the self-care leash when he had to.

"Yeah, yeah, mother," Steve grumbled, even though he was grateful for Sam watching out for him. Grateful, but not grateful enough to not be bitchy about his coffee.

"Mother? That's a new one. Wow! I never thought I'd be a mom," Sam said, shit eating grin on his face, dripping with sarcasm.

"My gosh, why do I even talk to you?" Steve griped.

"Because you love me and I'm handsome and wonderful."

"Well you aren't wrong."

Sam grinned. He seemed pleased with himself but Steve could still feel himself being watched, analyzed for any sign of being upset.

Then a sharp ring cut into their conversation and he swivelled around in his chair to face his desk, digging out a report form and picking up the phone.

He was met by the sound of muted quiet and light static. Immediately, Steve dropped any face of humor he had and straightened in his chair.

There was the sound of a slurred sob. "Hello?"

"Hi, hey. You've reached your local suicide hotline. Are you hurt?" Steve asked right away, pressing the sharp tip of his pencil to his desk. The tip crushed down, leaving a black spot and graphite dust on the corner of the page.

"No, yeah. . . I. . . mhm," the person said. It was a girl. She sounded distant and intoxicated, like half asleep already. A chill ran down Steve's spine. He marked down 'yes' on the line on the paper indicating whether or not the caller was hurt or impaired.

"Well we'll take care of you, don't worry," Steve said, managing to keep his voice level and calm. "Can you tell me your name?"

"It hurts. . . wasn't s'posed to hurt," the girl said. She sounded disbelieving, desperate. Steve swallowed hard, trying to ignore his own racing pulse. His heart was in his throat.

Sam was looking over at him, Steve realized. He was watching and frowning and Steve wished he'd go away so he could focus. "What happened? What hurts?" Steve asked.

"E'rything hurts, you gotta help . . . my stomach hurts . . . my toes feel . . .funny."

Steve clenched his jaw hard. His heart was pounding. He was too hot, the room was too hot. "What happened? I can send help to your address if you can tell me where you are," he said. Don't sound desperate, sound calm. Stay calm, they need you to be calm.

"My head," the girl whispered, crying out.

"We'll take care of you, I just need to know where you are."

"I ate all of 'em . . . ate . . . all these pills, and a lot of wine . . . You gotta help me, it wasn't s'posed to hurt," the girl said, a faint urgency laced in her voice. She sounded like she was slipping fast but she wouldn't give Steve a goddamn address.

"Address, I need your address. Then you'll be okay and they'll help you and it won't hurt anymore," Steve said, panic creeping into his voice.

He felt a hand on his shoulder and was aware of Sam behind him. "Steve, maybe transfer this one, deep breaths--"

Steve ignored him. There wasn't time to transfer her to anyone; she needed help ten minutes ago but all she had was Steve.

"'M at Henry's house," she said.

"What street? Where are you?" Steve asked. "What's your name?"

If he got her name he could at least send that to the emergency services and they could look her up and maybe link her to an address. Maybe.

But she didn't answer. "Your name- I need to know your name- please-"

The girl let out a shallow, breathy sigh and then she went dead silent. There was a shuffling sound like her hand loosened on the phone. And then nothing. The connection went dead and the dial tone was like a dead alarm.

He pressed redial frantically but nothing happened and he kept ending up at the goddamn dial tone-

Steve abruptly stood up, towering above the walls of his cubicle, dropping the phone back on the receiver. He'd failed, he'd lost her, she was gone, it was too late and he failed. He was so hot he was going to sweat out of his skin and the room was spinning, he was swaying on his feet and he couldn't breathe, he couldn't breathe, he couldn't breathe-

"Steve!" Sam said loudly. He'd been saying Steve's name over and over and Steve was suddenly aware of a lot of people staring at him above the tops of their boxy offices, Sam's hands on his shoulder as he tried to keep Steve steady, despite the big difference in weight.

Steve blinked as it came back into focus, looking at Sam.

"Breathe, man," Sam said, quieter now. "Deep breaths, okay? It's alright. You're okay."

Steve didn't realize he'd been holding his breath until he exhaled, letting it out slowly like a pricked balloon. He became aware of the space around him again, he was grounded. His head felt a little light as he breathed in again.

"Sorry," he croaked. It was humiliating because everyone knew losing someone was hard, but that call had been doomed from the start and Steve had failed- failure. Failure. She was dead, or on her way to it. Steve hadn't been enough to save her.

"Don't apologize, big guy, come on," Sam said. Steve thought he meant to sit, but apparently he didn't because Sam gently herded Steve out of the claustrophobic cubicle toward the break room.

"I lost her," he said blankly. Hot tears streaked down his cheeks. God, stop crying- stop- stop crying. He wiped his sleeve across his face to try and hide it.

"I know, it ain't your fault," Sam said, shutting the breakroom door behind them so Steve was away from everyone to calm down.

"It is, I could've- I should've just- if I could've got her address right off-"

"You can't blame yourself, you know it ain't healthy. C'mon, sit down. You gotta catch your breath," he said, leading Steve to a fold-up metal chair by the water cooler. Steve sat down and folded over, holding his head in his hands.

He didn't usually fall apart this badly but he didn't usually get calls like that. He almost always got someone an ambulance or transferred to a 911 operator or calmed down.

"She wasn't thinkin' straight, Sam, she took a bunch of pills and she wouldn't tell me anything," he hiccupped. God, he was crying. Great. At least it was just in front of Sam, but it was embarrassing anyways.

"Sometimes it happens and we can't do anything about it," Sam said. He was moving around the breakroom and Steve could hear him making hot water.

"I could've said the right things if I was just thinking-"

"You said all the right things, Steve, I was right there. I promise you, it wasn't your fault. The same thing would've happened if it was me, or anyone else. You did your best and sometimes it just isn't enough," Sam said. He always knew how to say the right things.

He pushed a warm mug into Steve's hands and Steve briefly looked up, forcing a grateful, wobbly smile. He caught a glimpse of his reflection on the glass of the door. He looked like a big wreck, all red and puffy and hunched over.

"I wished I never even picked up the phone- I'm a terrible, horrible person for it," he said, breathing in the steam coming off his cup.

"No, that ain't true. He all think that when we get a bad call," Sam said lightly. He pulled up a chair next to Steve, giving him enough space to breathe but being close enough for comfort.

"But then you think- if I never picked up, she would've. . . she would've, anyways, and no one woulda known and no one would remember. I don't even know her name but someone's got to remember her."

"Doesn't have to be you, Cap," Sam said. "That's a big load to carry. She had people in her life who'll remember her."

Steve remembered the girl talking about Henry and nodded. His lip wobbled and he tried to hold back another round of tears. Someone would miss her. Someone would find her body. Someone would see the phone and know that she tried and it wasn't enough.

"I don't think I can drink this right now," he mumbled, changing the subject and setting the cup of cocoa on the table. He dragged his sleeve across his face again.

"That's okay," Sam said. Steve couldn't look him in the eye. "Why don't you get home? I don't think you should take anymore calls tonight."

Steve knew he was right. He was in no state to have more people's lives depending on him right now. He felt a stone's throw from crumbling. "Yeah, okay."

"You got the car tonight or do you want me to call you a cab?"

"I got the car," Steve said. It wasn't far from when his shift usually ended, anyways. It was close to time to pick up Bucky. Bucky. The thought of him, for some reason, lessened the weight of the pit in his stomach. He hadn't let Bucky hang up. He hadn't failed him.

Yet.

"Alright, big guy. Just give yourself a couple minutes to cool down before you try driving, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," he said. "I'm sorry. Thank you. For, y'know."

Sam nodded, smiling tightly. "Yeah, I know."

"You can go back, I'll be okay," Steve said. He'd managed to stop crying and he wasn't hiccupping or snotting anymore. Sam nodded, standing up out of his chair.

"You call me when you get home safe, okay?" he made Steve promise.

"I will."

Sam left Steve alone in the breakroom to catch his breath, going back to his cubicle. Steve held his head in his hands and tried to calmly get his head clear. He tried to flush away any thought of Henry's girl, whoever she was, for now. There would be time to think about her later, privately. Steve always tried to remember the ones he lost, at least for a while.

Sam was right when he said it wasn't healthy, but it was a conscious choice Steve made. They didn't deserve to be forgotten, and Steve couldn't help but feel responsible, no matter how many times Sam said otherwise.

When he was feeling more stable, he thought of Bucky. Bucky was a reminder that no matter how much Steve got wrong, he'd gotten that right. He had a living, breathing reminder of it. A lot of times, that was something that consoled Steve.

That probably wasn't healthy, either, putting so much emotional dependence on someone he wasn't that close with. They'd become friends in the past two weeks but they had no real ties and Steve was afraid of what would happen when Bucky left.

He was afraid of the fact that he secretly hoped Bucky never would leave.

__________

Usually, Bucky was guarded and exhausted when at the end of his shift when Steve came pick him up, but tonight, he was in a good mood and he could hardly keep from grinning when the car rolled up. How would he go about it? Would he just give Steve the envelope like it was nothing, or would he explain first? Maybe just leave it on the table for Steve to find and be surprised by?

He couldn't decide and for once, he actually felt like talking. Usually, at this time of night he'd be thinking about how to make sure to keep his mouth shut the best he could and just focus on getting back to the apartment and to bed, but now, he was the furthest from guarded and sullen he'd been yet.

The tires crunches across gravel to a stop and Bucky heard the click of the door unlocking. He pulled it open, escaping into the warmth of the car. He'd noticed that the heater in the old car was touchy and he was relieved to feel it working.

He was barely keeping from smiling, envelope with his pay still tucked into his jacket pocket. "Hey," he said, trying to sound even and like usual.

HIs face fell when he heard the deflated tone of Steve's voice. "Hi, Buck."

Bucky looked up, blinking. Steve looked like a mess. His eyes were red and weary, he was slouched over, shoulders sunk like defeated. There was no light about him and although he was smiling, as if really happy to see Bucky, it was thin and transparent.

"What's wrong?" Bucky said automatically.

Steve looked a little surprised. Bucky knew he shouldn't be offended by that because after all, he kind of put off an attitude like he didn't care. But then again, Steve had done so much for Bucky that Bucky couldn't help caring about him like crazy.

"I'm fine," Steve said. It was a hilarious lie. He seemed the opposite of fine. Weariness hung in the lines of his body and face.

"No, what happened?"

"Doesn't matter," Steve said, sighing. He sounded like he was afraid to burden Bucky with whatever it was, which Bucky found ironic because of everything Steve had done for him. Everything Steve was doing for him right now.

"It does matter. You seem not okay. You can tell me," Bucky said. He hated sounded pushy or intrusive because he sure didn't deserve to know, but Steve deserved someone to talk to and Bucky was the only one there. He wasn't what Steve deserved but he was all he had.

He was almsot startled by how worried he found himself.

"It was a rough night at work," Steve finally said when he left the parking lot. Bucky watched him while he talked. In the dark, he was a silhouette against the streetlights passing out the window.

A rough night at work- work, where did he work? A call center. A suicide hotline. Oh. Bucky could see what that implied right away and his disposition changed. He wasn't cheerful or bouncing anymore and he'd all but forgotten about the excitment of his paycheck.

"Oh," he said. It was dumb and he didn't know how to begin to say anything else. How could he understand what Steve felt? Bucky never saved anyone from anything. He'd never even tried.

They drove in silence for a few minutes. The only sound was the heater weakly pumping out heat, until it spluttered out and Bucky mumbled a curse, banging it with the heel of his hand until it rattled back on.

"Some girl killed herself," Steve said, almost out of the blue. It was like he'd been building up to saying it for a while. "Some girl. I didn't even get her name."

"I'm sorry," Bucky said quietly. No sarcasm, no bad humor or bitterness. Sincerity felt a little foreign coming out of his own mouth.

"Me too. I wasn't able to stop her and I just- you get messed up about it when people call and you lose 'em," he explained.

Bucky remembered calling. He remembered calling and instantly regretting it and being ready to hang up, and he remembered how adamantly Steve hadn't let him. He remembered not understanding why someone would go out of their way and go through so much trouble for some stupid guy.

Now he thought he maybe understoof Steve a little better.

If Bucky hadn't let Steve help him, would Steve have mourned him like this?

"You lost one but I bet you save a lot. I mean, I'm here. You can't save the whole world, y'know?"

"I can try," Steve said.

Bucky frowned. "Why, though?"

"I don't understand," Steve said. "Why wouldn't I?"

"But why would you? There's a lot out there not worth saving. You're just one guy," Bucky said. He was trying to help but he was fumbling and saying the wrong things and he was afraid he was just making it worse.

"Everyone is just one guy, Buck. If everyone tried, think of how much better things could be," Steve said.

"You really believe that?" Bucky asked. He sure didn't. It was a waste of time to think about how things could be when the way things already were took up so much time. Why think about what could be? There was enough to worry about.

"Of course I do," Steve said. "I just- I wish I'd done better for her."

"You did the best you could, didn't you?" Bucky said.

"Well, yeah."

"Then let it go," he said. "It's over. It would have happened anyways if you weren't there so there's no way it's your fault."

That didn't seem to be the right thing to say at all because Steves face seemed to fall. "You're right. It's just hard."

"If anyone could do it, it'd be you, though," Bucky added quietly. "Save the world, I mean. I don't think I've ever met an idiot who cares more than you."

The corner of Steve's mouth turned up a little. "Thanks, Buck."

Bucky tried to smile, too.

__________

He remembered about the envelope containing his pay a while after they got home.

Steve had just gone to bed and Bucky was up still, sitting on the kitchen counter with a glass of water, watching the sun come up out the east facing window. He was a sucker for weather and sky- he liked rain and snow and he loved watching the colors paint the sky just before the world woke up.

It was a silly pleasure and Alexander had reminded him of it countless times but he felt safe in the quiet of the empty kitchen.

He finished his water and washed his face and brushed his teeth, heading for the living room to draw the blinds shut, hoping to block a little daylight while he slept. He was getting out of his clothes and into a set of Steve's huge pajamas when the envelope slipped out of the jacket pocket, landing at Bucky's feet on the floor.

He picked it up and the smiling feeling returned. He yanked the shirt on over his head, switching out of his black jeans into worn out flannel. He'd just see if Steve was sleeping and slide it under the door.

He was proud but he also didn't want to make a big deal of it.

He crept down the hall, taking light steps. Peggy wasn't awake yet and he didn't want to wake her. When he got to Steve's door, he was surprised to find it open- just ajar.

Bucky was just about to lightly tap on the door, hand hovering, when he heard it. A light, muffled cry, like pressed into a pillow.

Bucky lowered his hand slowly from the door.

"'M sorry . . . 'm sorry," he was muttering, choking himself off in another round of hushed cries and hiccups. Bucky's eyes went wide, staring in through the crack in the door. Steve was curled in on himself on the bed crying.

He couldn't watch, but he couldn't look away. He was frozen like a deer in the headlights.

Bucky's heart ached for him. Steve didn't deserve to be crying as quietly as he could, alone, at the break of day. He deserved so much better.

Adrenaline coursed through him at the prospect of being caught because he knew Steve wouldn't want to be seen like this. It was strange, like seeing a teacher outside of school or seeing the moon in the sky during the day. He was so vulnerable. Radiant, brave, sunshiney Steve was breaking to pieces behind closed doors, and Bucky was accidentally seeing some hidden, intimate part of him.

He gently set the envelope on the floor without making a sound.

This was what Bucky had been trying to avoid. Despite himself, he cared.

**Author's Note:**

> Suicide warning; Steve works at a suicide hotline, Bucky calls the number. Watch out there. 
> 
> Very, very, very ambiguously implied non-con; not even, really, but it's implied that Alexander manipulates Bucky so yeah.


End file.
